Samantha Morton on Circe Odyssey role: It felt like a rebirth
Samantha Morton's roughly 10-minute turn as Circe in Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey is drawing early awards buzz, with Nolan calling her the film's fulcrum. The actress says the Circe Odyssey role “felt like a rebirth” after years of fewer major Hollywood offers. According to Variety, she commandeers the action epic when she appears about halfway through.
Key Takeaways
- Morton's Circe sequence lasts roughly 10 minutes but is being widely praised as a standout.
- She reframes Circe as a woman protecting herself after seeing brutality, not merely Homer's temptress.
- Christopher Nolan called her the “fulcrum” of The Odyssey; producer Emma Thomas said the cast and crew gave her the first standing ovation on a Nolan set since Heath Ledger's Joker.
- Morton, 49, cried when Nolan offered the part and described landing it as a second chance to be seen.
Why is Samantha Morton's Circe Odyssey performance turning heads?
In Nolan's adaptation of Homer, Circe transforms Odysseus' men into pigs. Morton does not have much screen time, but Variety reports her searing performance seizes the film in that mid-movie stretch.
The Daily Beast argues she delivers the movie's best turn in a cast that includes Matt Damon, Zendaya, Tom Holland, Charlize Theron, and Anne Hathaway. Nolan told the Los Angeles Times her character “comes in and changes the dynamic,” admiring that “there are no limitations on her performance.”
Fans following celebrity breaking news will note the awards chatter already forming around a supporting role that opened with the film on Friday.
How did Morton approach playing Circe differently?
Where Homer's Circe is often cast as a beautiful temptress, Morton's version is a woman who has seen too much brutality and uses magic as a safeguard against sexual violence, Variety reports. She drew on her military family background and stories of assault within her family.
“I could identify with her. She felt like my sister, my mother, my gran, my aunt, my neighbor,” she told The Hollywood Reporter, quotes echoed by The Daily Beast and Gizmodo. She had never read Homer's poem—though she had seen The Simpsons parody—but found Nolan's script “incredibly contemporary.”
On set, she filmed Circe luring soldiers, drugging them, and transforming them with her bare hands, while adjusting to massive, noisy IMAX cameras that weigh about 300 pounds.
Why did the Circe Odyssey role feel like a rebirth?
When Nolan asked to meet about the project, Morton cried. “He could have anybody on the planet, and he chose me,” she told Variety. A two-time Oscar nominee for Sweet and Lowdown and In America, she said major movie roles for older actresses are “few and far between,” with most recent work in independents and television.
“It felt like a rebirth,” Morton said. “To get the role felt like a second chance to be seen by the wider world.” She is not chasing trophies—“I've never been somebody that chased that kind of gratification”—but peers' recognition would still mean something, she added.